I’ve thought this for a long time, but the insanity of the US healthcare system makes is such that it erases the wage differences between here and countries with national healthcare systems for a huge percentage of the population long term.
You’re essentially gambling that you won’t be struck by a finance destroying health crisis for a long enough time that you’ll come out ahead overall. But when you think about the fact that 35-40% of people develop cancer in their lifetimes, or the “financial death by a thousand procedures” described in the post, that seems unlikely, at least for a good portion of people.
I dunno, whenever I see European or Canadian software engineering salaries mentioned, I do some quick math and it seems like I come out way ahead, even if I were to pay my family’s out of pocket maximum every year.
You’re essentially gambling that you won’t be struck by a finance destroying health crisis for a long enough time that you’ll come out ahead overall. But when you think about the fact that 35-40% of people develop cancer in their lifetimes, or the “financial death by a thousand procedures” described in the post, that seems unlikely, at least for a good portion of people.